Next
by Guest33
Summary: An idea of what could've happened after the bus crash in the anime. (Riki/Kurugaya) I appreciate any tips or criticism so please leave a review or favorite if you liked it!


Quick note: This is a mix of not writing absolutely anything for three months, trying out a new style and writing between midnight to 3 in the morning. Expectations should probably match that. I wrote this from Kurugaya's POV, however, since I re-watched the anime a week before this and saw her route's ending three days before for the first time I think I messed up her personality. Please enjoy.

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I suddenly jolted awake in my bed. Something was off. That's, at least, what my intuition told me. My intuition was almost never wrong. Instinctively I looked over to the calendar to make sure that yesterday stayed yesterday; I couldn't stand it if _that_ incident happened again. I let out a sigh of relief after double-checking today's date. Today was still today. Everything in my room seemed normal, too. So what was this feeling?

_Bzzt. Bzzt._

I reached over and grabbed my cell phone. There was a message from Kyousuke for everyone to meet in Riki's classroom immediately. Judging by the time it was still a good three hours or so before classes were supposed to begin. I wonder if everyone can make it…I guess there's no time for such thoughts. I quickly started to begin my morning routine by changing. I guess I'll be attending class today.

The corridors in the school were deafly quiet. So quiet in fact that one could hear a pin drop. It was weird to see the school like this. Even in such a terrible place as the dream world there were people, but there were none here. It seemed as though there were no souls in the building at all. Even as I grabbed the doorknob I half-expected there to be no one in the classroom.

"One more arrives!" Kyousuke announced from the front of the classroom as I stepped through the doorway. He was standing at the front of the classroom parading around with a meter stick as if he were the king of teachers gathering his loyal subjects. In front of him stood the Little Busters.

"What is all of this?" I asked, making sure to keep up my confident demeanor despite the tugging sensation in my stomach. The strange feeling wasn't getting any stronger, but somehow it felt more potent now than before. Did anyone else have this?

"We need to wait for two more before we can figure anything out," Kyousuke said pointing at the Busters in front of him. There was Kud, Komari, Kengo, Haruka, Rin and Mio. Indeed he was right. Young-man Masato and Riki were missing from the crowd. I guess they were the ones who couldn't make it on time. Instead of walking up to the crowd I chose to stay closer to the door since it felt like a better idea in case something weird happened. This action almost instantly proved contradicting when the door flew open at astonishing speed.

"Uahhh!" Masato cried out as he fumbled through the door frame panting. "Has anyone seen Riki? I searched the entire school and there's no one! Not even my own muscle-mate! What am I going to do?" He seemed to fall to the floor in dread over his failed search, his hands covering his face. It was certainly no stretch to believe that had spent the last few minutes running through the school looking for people when you considered his physical condition and how out of breath he seemed, but that only made the fact that his search ended up fruitless even harder to believe.

"What do you mean that there isn't anyone in the school?" Kyousuke asked, his voice a mix of worry and confusion. His words had seemed to have struck a chord with everyone in the room since the Buster's expressions changed to match both his worry and confusion. Surely all of them had noticed the strange absences, and if all of them had noticed, then did they also feel the same feeling, the very one that forced me awake? Wait, there was something else in his voice. When he spoke there was an undertone almost like he knew something. No, he _did_ know something, or at least thought he knew something, now the only question was what.

"I mean, like, everyone except for us is gone. Poof. Vanished into thin air! There wasn't anyone at the cafeteria, either!" Masato said in disbelief. Though why he decided to specify the cafeteria was anyone's guess.

"Kyousuke! What's the meaning of this?" Kengo bellowed at the front of the classroom. He looked like he was ready to pick a fight, but not with Kyousuke. It looked more like he was releasing his anger at whatever was closest, or most likely.

"For once I really don't know. You know that if I had any control I would've let you in on it!" Kyousuke yelled back while pointing his meter stick at Kengo. Lie. He knew something that we didn't. Maybe he thought that it was best to not tell anyone, but that didn't give him a right to lie like that to the face of his friend. However, Kengo seemed to accept his words and backed down.

"W-what's happening?" Kud stammered while twirling her fingers in a cute fashion…no, now isn't the time for that.

"Maybe Kurugaya knows something," Haruka suggested and looked back at me. Soon everyone else in the room followed after her and did the same causing me to take a single step back, but my demeanor remained. There was only one thing that could break my demeanor, and he wasn't here.

"I'm just as lost as you," I informed them, much to their disappointment. I may be smart, but one needs pieces to solve a puzzle. This felt like solving a mathematics problem without being given all the conditions. There were too many 'if's and 'maybe's to make sense of anything that was happening.

"Let's go over the information, then," Kyousuke said, trying to keep the situation together. "We know that people are missing from the school. Unless we were all left out on something pretty big we can come to the conclusion that this isn't normal." He forced his words to come out like they were a big discovery, even though he was stating the obvious. Somehow, it actually managed to work a little bit.

"Even if we were left out on something big, everyone leaving suddenly like this still wouldn't be normal," Masato pointed out, earning a few nods from the crowd and giving him a boost of self-confidence.

"I meant something _not_ normal, not something not normal," Kyousuke said, almost tripping on his 'not's by the end. His clarification wasn't even needed. After what we had been through we all knew that not normal wasn't the same for us as it was for others. We were survivors, thanks to Riki, of the infamous place known as the dream world. The world that let dreams come to life and then cruelly crushed them right in front of- …I am getting carried away.

"I don't really understand what's happening, but I have this weird feeling in my stomach. Kind of like the feeling you get when you eat cat food, but different. That helps, right?" Rin spoke up. Her voice carried a pretty large undertone of worry. That's right. After I had Riki forget me, didn't he and Rin…never mind. I can leave those thoughts for after we get out of whatever this is. Normally Komari would've hugged her or something as a reward, but the situation was much too tense for that. No dared to move. After all, our glue and new leader of the Little Busters, Riki, was nowhere to be found. How do you kill the body? You cut off the head or cut out the heart. It seemed like whatever this was had managed to do both. Complete overkill if you ask me.

"I have that sensation, too," Mio also spoke up and was soon joined by a chorus of other voices, including my own. It seemed that the feeling was shared, but at the same time mine somehow felt…different. The others described the feeling as sinking or something of the sort and, while I also had that feeling, there was also another feeling with it. Did no one else feel it?

"So that means that we have another hint. First everyone is gone and second we all have a strange feeling," Kyousuke announced, trying to put two incompatible pieces together. Even with that we weren't any closer to finding out what happened than before.

"We're in it, aren't we? We're in another dream world," Haruka was the first to panic, her voice trembling with every word muttered as she slowly backed away from the crowd. "Then that…that means that someone's close to dying, doesn't it?! Riki's missing, too! What if…what if Riki's…" She wasn't able to finish her sentence. It was too horrible a thought and she was already at the verge of tears. Ever since her brush with her family she had become very stable, but in turn she also became a lot more sensitive when it came to either Riki or her sister. One could almost see it as a trade-off. It was no surprise that she was the first to suggest what everyone was thinking.

"We can't know all of that for sure," Kyousuke said trying to calm the crowd down, but it was futile. Heads were already moving from one side and even Komari looked to be on the verge of tears, too. Even Masato in his corner looked to be scared speechless. A wave of dread had crashed into all of us. The simple reality was that there was a possibility…that…Riki… No, I mustn't let my emotions take control of me! Not in a moment like this. I had to stay calm for his sake and for everyone else's sake. If Kyousuke could keep everyone calm then I might be able to figure something out.

"It seems to be an undeniable fact that we're back into a world like before, but we don't know the circumstances around it. If Riki isn't here then we can't ask him so we can't know for sure. Perhaps whoever created this world just left Riki out of it for whatever reason," Kengo said, also trying to manage the situation, but even he looked unnerved. His words did something, but panic and anxiety spread throughout the room like a plague.

"Even this feeling is probably a symptom of being put back into the dream world," Mio observed as if she was studying the common cold or something, but that would explain why we all had it.

"No, I don't think so," Kyousuke said with more confidence than everything else he had said up until now. He knew something and I needed to either confront him now or later and with someone's life, maybe even Riki's life, on the line there was no later.

"You know something don't you?" I asked him with a glare. All heads instantly turned towards him begging for answers.

"So you did know something after all!" Kengo challenged Kyousuke, who was now being pushed back by invisible words.

"I suppose I might," Kyousuke said as he swallowed with some difficulty and then looked around at us. "I didn't want to say anything until I had more information."

"Don't keep something important from us!" Kengo yelled back at him. After trusting him once and being let down he was keeping on edge.

"Okay, okay," Kyousuke said trying to calm the situation down. "What are the last memories that everyone has?"

"Yesterday it was a week since Riki saved us, correct?" Mio asked, much to the confusion of Kyousuke.

"Is that what everyone else remembers, too?" Kyousuke asked us and was replied to with 'yes's coming from all of us. That was even my last memory.

"I hate to tell you, but all your memories are off by three days," Kyousuke informed us. Three days? Three whole days?! That's impossible! What happened in those days? What happened that we don't remember? Suddenly a headache overwhelmed me like my brain was pulling at memories that weren't there, memories that were desperately trying to come out into existence, but could not.

"What happened in those three days?" Rin asked. The worry in her voice was now clear as day and her usual reserved tone was nowhere to be found.

"A week after Riki saved us the dream world completely lost its hold on him and every memory he had forgotten or was erased from his mind forcefully and at once rushed back into him. He must've felt something pretty strong because his narcolepsy instantly hit. The only difference was that this time he didn't wake up. He's been hospitalised for three or four days now depending on what time it is in the real world, assuming that we haven't been here long," Kyousuke informed us. There was dead silence now in the room. The atmosphere now, instead of feeling anxious or worried, felt…silent. Even the empty hallways seemed festive in comparison. Dead silence ruled the room. The feeling now made sense. Even if we didn't remember how we felt, our bodies did. We all had a feeling of dread lurking deep inside of us. So then what was this other feeling?

"So what do we do? Why did Riki bring us into this world?" Kengo yelled out angrily. Once again he didn't seem particularly angry at anyone, but was still taking his anger out on Kyousuke.

"We don't even know if Riki created this world on purpose. Besides, he's not here talking to us so it doesn't seem like he created it to say goodbye, at the very least. Also, I have a plan," Kyousuke announced, smirking at the end.

"What plan is that?" Kengo asked. He was more reserved now, but he was still on edge.

"Love," Kyousuke simply said to the astonishment of everyone. "I'm going to call it operation love-"

"We're not calling it that," Kengo said, interrupting him. Kyousuke only frowned before pulling out a manga from the teacher's desk that was confiscated from him earlier.

"Then how about operation-" Kyousuke once again started, but was cut off in a similar fashion by Kengo.

"We're not going through this again!" Kengo yelled back at him. Whatever it was that they were talking about seemed like it had happened before so I was almost inclined to ask. Almost. There was no time for such questions.

"You know your plan sounds stupid. What is 'love' even going to do?" Masato interrupted.

"You're the last person I wanted to hear that from," Kyousuke muttered with his face now downcast at the comment.

"What was that?" Masato asked as he stepped forward and raised his fist. Luckily he didn't seem to be genuinely offended.

"Masato has a point. How is your plan going to work?" Kengo asked trying to move the situation forward.

"It's simple," Kyousuke said with a large grin. "Love is the strongest emotion. If we can find someone who loves Riki enough maybe we can get through to him and save him. They say that love can transcend even time and space, so why not this world?" Someone who loves him…someone who loves Riki…

"How's it going to work?" Rin asked with a strong look in her eyes. Ever since she had left the crash she had been just like a new person. Now she was much more sociable and assertive when it came to certain things and especially when those things had something to do with Riki.

"First we have to separate the people who love him and the people who don't so we know who's going to be useful," Kyousuke informed us and then walked to the center of the space in front of the class and dropped his meter stick on the floor cutting it in half. "Those of you who love Riki go on that half and those who don't stay on my side." While saying this he pointed to the section in front of him which was right beside the windows.

"I guess there's no choice," Masato said smiling as he walked into the 'love' section, much to everyone's shock.

"M-Masato!" Kengo yelled in surprise at his actions.

"What?" Masato asked back genuinely confused. Didn't he realize how dangerous of a situation he put himself into?

"Masato," Kyousuke called from his half. "When I said 'love' I meant _love_."

"Are you trying to say that I don't love Riki? Besides, why aren't you here, too?" Masato asked like he was picking a fight. Just how dense can someone be? Even if your intentions are good, you're just slowing the process down.

"Masato," Kengo said already fed up with the situation. "Kyousuke meant the love that only two certain people can have for each other. Not the kind of love friends or family have for each other." It took a while to sink it, but finally Masato seemed to understand it as his eyes grew wider at the thought. After that he instantly removed himself from the 'love' half and walked over behind Kyousuke in shame muttering something too quietly for me to hear. It was quiet then for what seemed like a few minutes before-

"Yahahaha, that's how it is," Haruka said as she walked over to the 'love' section while scratching the back of her head. She seemed embarrassed, but at the same time content and satisfied with her decision. Even with her still being shaken up from the news she was still able to go first. Frankly it wasn't surprising that she decided to walk over there if you looked at how she acted around Riki ever since he solved her problem, but it was still surprising that she was the first. I quickly shifted my view to Rin and saw her nervously moving her legs about like a child whom you had just told that you were going to drive away without them if they wanted to stay so badly.

"E-Even if I'm still like a child, I know that this is how I feel," Kud said as she looked down disappointingly at herself and then joined Haruka in the 'love' section. I once again looked over to Rin and now she was bouncing around more than ever with anxiety. It looked as if she really wanted to go, but at the same time there was something holding her back. Embarrassment, perhaps? Even if she had changed a great deal, she was still Rin. Something like this would've been embarrassing for anyone.

"M-Me too," Rin spoke up softly as the tension finally got to her. She then silently started walking over to the rapidly-expanding group with all eyes trained on her.

"Wait for me," Komari called as she started to run after Rin. There were now four people in the box who believed that they loved Riki. It was quite a harem he had going for himself here. In fact, he should be saying…never mind.

"I also believe it is my place there," Mio said as she left for the group. She carried with her a relatively monotone expression, but in her eyes there was the slightest of a sparkle. All that Kyousuke had managed to accomplish with this was move the majority of the group from one place to the other. Suddenly all heads in the room turned to me as if waiting for my response. I guess I was somewhat of a trump card, right? I wonder if that's how they viewed me.

"You already know my answer," I told them. I was more than comfortable in my current spot. Really, though, I didn't trust myself to move forward. If I did that I might lose some of my composure.

"Please just step into a section," Kyousuke told both Kengo and I. I guess that there was no arguing with someone who wouldn't give up. Slowly we both got up and made our ways to our chosen destination. Along the way I could feel my heart beat accelerate. This seemed pointless. Even if all of us harboured feelings of love for Riki, he had already made his decision, right? So why not just take Rin? Or maybe there was a reason for all us being in this world? Even in the end it looked like all Kyousuke had managed to accomplish was separating the genders.

"Good. Now that we have everyone sorted we can figure out what to do," Kyousuke said making himself sound like he knew exactly what he was doing. Needless to say, none of us were fooled.

"So you have no plan? I knew this was stupid!" Masato said grabbing his head with both his hands.

"Wait, I just thought of something. All of us went through the building at one point, but none of us found anything. What if that was because we needed to be together in order to find something? Our combined love should be more than enough to get to him!" Kyousuke called out with a triumphant look on his face.

"And do you think that will work?" Kengo asked. He seemed really suspicious of the plan, but at the same time he looked like he really wanted to believe it would work.

"At this point all we can do is hope. Mission start!" Kyousuke said and without waiting for any response he headed out the door and into the hallway calling out for Riki. We all just looked at each other and after an unspoken consensus headed out after him.

"We've been walking for a few minutes now calling out to Riki and so far nothing has happened," Kengo complained, but was only met with silence. "Kyousuke?" Kyousuke had suddenly stopped and was just standing there, not even moving a muscle.

"There's no way we looped around the school, is there?" Kyousuke silently asked with worry in his voice.

"No," Mio simply told him. I was further in the back so I couldn't see what they were looking at, but it seemed really important. Wasn't this hallway familiar?

"There's no way it could've gotten this dark so soon, too, right?" Kyousuke asked again in his unusually calm voice. From back in the hallway I could see Mio nod. He had a point, it was bright out when we had met up in the classroom, but now there was almost no light to be had. "I see. That means that Riki's telling us that there's something through this door." Kyousuke opened the door and walked in. As I followed in after him I was shocked to find out that we were back where we started - in the classroom. At first there was nothing particularly unusual about the classroom, that is until I looked over to one of the windows. There were two people standing at the windows, two people that I knew very well. In front of them the sky looked to be a mix of hundreds of different colors.

"Does anyone else see that?" I asked in a wavering voice while pointing to the window. Everyone else turned their attention to where my finger was pointing, but all I received were empty stares.

"See what?" Masato asked. "Are you trying to trick me?" He didn't seem to put much power into his words, maybe my reaction was convincing him that I wasn't joking around this time. I could only imagine how wide my eyes must've been.

"Could everyone please leave the room?" I asked. Kyousuke seemed to understand and quickly led everyone out of the room. The only person who was reluctant to leave was Rin, but eventually she left, too. The reason I asked this was because of the two people standing there. They were both around the same height except that one was a boy with brown hair and the other was a girl with long, darkish hair. The two standing there were none other than Riki and myself. We were standing there in front of the fireworks staring at each other with a phone, his phone, dropped to the ground. Kyousuke did mention his memories returning so was it possible that…? What was I supposed to do with this? What was Riki trying to say with this illusion? I walked over to the mirage and swiped my hand through it. Instead of fading in and out of reality my hand simply went through. Not knowing what else to do I walked into my imaginary body.

"Kurugaya?" Riki's voice called out from the fake body. Since stepping into my own illusion the world had come to life around me. Fireworks popped in the distance and his body seemed to be as alive as possible.

"Yes?" I asked in shock, my entire body jumping upward from his words. I was _not_ expecting it to talk. How did I even end up like this? A dream world inside of a dream world? That was a scary thought.

"What are you doing inside my dream?" Riki asked as he tilted his head. Didn't he know that he had created a dream world? Was he thinking that he was only in some kind of dream?

"Boy, you have to listen to me," I sternly told him. "Right now you're in a dream world like before, except this time you're the one who caused it. You need to figure out how to end this or else you might-" What started out as a stern voice quickly degraded into what almost became a whimper. At this point I was almost on the verge of tears. How could I possibly tell him that he was on the verge of dying? I guess it's implied by the whole dream world, but that's on the assumption that there aren't any exceptions.

"I thought so," Riki quietly said and then smiled a sweet, but sad smile before continuing. "Ever since my memory came back, this is the scene that's been playing over and over in my head. Here you asked me if I ever truly loved someone. The answer was yes. I just never said it. Kurugaya I-"

"Stop!" I quickly yelled. "Don't finish that. You have Rin right now. I wasn't there to see it, but I heard about you two. If you're together then you can't do something like this." My words seemed to trouble him, but he still continued on as if my words hadn't had any significant impact.

"Back when we were in that world Kyousuke thought that only Rin and I survived. Because of that he pushed us together and when I fell in love with you first…you know what happened next. Both of you had me forget my feelings. Now my feelings have come back and I know that you're the one that I truly love. I still care for Rin, a lot, but my feelings…I don't feel the same way about her that I feel about you. I think that by now even Rin knows it, or at least she has an idea about it," Riki told me. The entire time he kept a serious face so I knew he wasn't lying. It looked like it had taken him quite a bit of courage to get those words out of his mouth. Thinking back to it this would explain Rin's behavior the entire time. Did that mean she also remembered as much as Kyousuke back at that time? It's probably best not to think too much into it.

"So what happens next?" I asked him. I was in shock from his sudden confession. I think I might've even let a single tear slide down my cheek from happiness. He loved me more than Rin. He had remembered his feelings.

"Now you wake up," He said as he smiled again. Everything went black. An ever-expanding nothingness engulfed me. All I managed to do before I lost consciousness was wonder if this is what narcolepsy felt like.

"Argh," I groaned as I lifted my head up. Where was I? What had just happened? And more importantly why was my room all white? I looked around and I suddenly realized that I wasn't in my room or anywhere close to it. I was in the hospital. In the bed where I was resting my head on was Riki.

"That's right," I said to no one in particular as I recalled the events from the now-distant dream world. I hope everyone else exited it alright. I couldn't help but smile at the words he had spoken. He remembered and he really felt the same way. He really did. Did this mean it would be alright now? I suddenly realized my face was wet and touched it with my left hand. Tears? Were they tears of pain or tears of joy? Never mind, it didn't matter now. The dream world was gone and Riki was still breathing. That meant that it was going to be okay, right? This time it was truly going to be okay. I felt the feeling of dread leave my body and all that was left was the other feeling. If this was over, then what was the other feeling? The one that I couldn't tell or recognize?

"I see," I silently said and smiled happily. Clutched in my right hand was his. Even more amazingly he had grabbed my hand back so it was like we were both holding hands. I understood now. The feeling that I had never felt before. It was the warmth of another person. It was the warmth of someone you truly loved. It was the warmth of Riki.

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After notes: Thank you for reading and I apologize for any bad quality (basically everything). I also hope it didn't feel too rushed. Sadly I wasn't able to add in separations between paragraphs, either, so I apologize for that, too. Now a big question: should this be continued? Although I originally intended it to be a oneshot, after finishing it and seeing the lack of fanfics for this fandom I feel like I can add more onto it. If I can get a few people to tell me to continue (three would be amazing), then I will. It might take a while to complete (at most a month), though, and don't expect any better quality. If whoever's reading this is okay with those terms, please let me know. Once again, thank you.


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